Found a great article about the anniversary of the surrender of Nazi Germany in 1945. The author makes a great point about how one tyranical regime was replaced with another, Stalin's Soviet Empire.

As a result of the Great Patriotic War, Finland had its Karelian Peninsula torn away by Stalin and 10 Christian countries -- Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary and Yugoslavia -- endured Stalinist persecution and tyranny for half a century.

Between 13 million and 15 million Germans were ethnically cleansed from the Baltic region, Poland and Czechoslovakia. Two million, mostly women and children, perished in an orgy of murder, rape and massacre that attended that greatest forced exodus in European history.

Yes, it was a great day when Nazi Germany fell, but I truly believe the decades following Germany's downfall were equally as bad for Europe because of the Soviet Union's terrible rule, which was allowed to happen because of the West's fear of Stalin. They threw him a few bones (Eastern Europe, Baltics, etc) to placate him. Sadly, the bones were the lives of millions over several generations.